Myth Gods Tech - Omnibus Edition: Science Fiction Meets Greek Mythology In The God Complex Universe (8 page)

“
Yeah?” I asked feigning innocence.

“
Weren’t you at Deppy’s?” my father asked, not really accusing
me of anything, simply asking.

“
Yeah…” I replied. Oh man, did my comebacks get monosyllabic
when I was tired or what?

“
Well? Why are you walking around so early? It was dark
outside a few minutes ago.”

“
I had my period,” I said, coming up with an excuse. “Deppy
gave me a pad but it doesn’t fit right. She is too short. There is
blood everywhere. You gotta see the carnage!” I added, stepping
into the kitchen, full into his view.

I
gambled on men’s instinctual reaction to avoid anything menstrual
related, and I was spot on. My dad put up his hand to block his
eyes and pulled away. “Uh, OK honey, I believe you. The bathroom is
all yours,” he said trying not to show how uneasy he
was.

I went
back to my room and said, “I won’t be long, you’ll be on time for
work.” I took off my dirty pants, my scraped t-shirt, the blanket
that I had used outdoors, and threw them all under the bed for now.
I put on my bathrobe and went to take a shower.

As the
water washed away the dirt and the sweat, I felt marginally better.
But my thoughts were troubled. Was this how I was going to live
from now on? Chased by my very own personal furies? Living life in
segments of 109 minutes, having to do all the stuff people normally
do around that schedule? Eating, resting, studying, all inside that
time-gap?

Would I
be able to keep on studying? Going to school? I’d need to leave
class without notice, every day for at least four times per day. It
would make every single day a chore. Not that it already wasn’t,
but time flew by sometimes. My Erinyes would make sure I’d never be
relaxed again.

If my
parents were in on this with me, maybe we could come up with a
medical condition to explain away my “episodes” to the teachers.
But how could I explain this to them? Dad would simply die of
sorrow if he found out that the new veil phone he gave me was
somehow linked to this.

Plus, it
was a practical matter. Going to the small forest to spend the
night had been a rather bad idea. The mere thought of having to
spend another night, let alone another attack in a dark scary
forest got me shivering despite the warm running water on me. I’d
have to find another way, someplace where I could escape the
Erinyes attack without people gawking at me. Taking video of me,
laughing at my condition.

I
shivered again.

The
comfort of my home was the only thing that was keeping me from
bursting into tears. I leaned out the shower and grabbed my watch.
Being waterproof was handy, it turns out. I have less than an hour
till the next attack. If I hadn’t gathered myself, my thoughts,
calmed myself with a shower, I’d have gone mad when it
came.

I
thought about it.

Be on
the run. Someplace open, not too crowded. It didn’t really matter
where, I just needed to avoid dangerous stuff like train-tracks and
busy roads. Hiding didn’t seem work.

Only
running.

Chapter
31

I was at
a roadside, in an open place. It was a big open piece of land next
to a highway, that had stacked ceramics and statues for sale. I was
going past it daily on the bus, and I’d never noticed anyone
actually manning the place. The ground was full of white rounded
gravel, noisy but it didn’t matter at morning. I didn’t know if
anyone actually sold anything here, it could have been one of those
businesses that had closed down and never been resold.

I was
sitting on a brown smokestack. It had some shade from the tiny
shack that they used to have as an office there. It had been easy
to jump over the fence, but my aching muscles had made it a small
torture.

I was
checking my phone every two seconds.

Now,
that fact wasn’t unusual for me, the social media addict that I was
with narcissistic tendencies, as Billy would put it. The unusual
part was that I was waiting for Prodromos to call me back, or at
least reply with a message or something.

I had
hoped for a result like: “Stand in a puddle of water facing east
and she wont get to you anymore.” Don’t mock me, I was still
optimistic back then! Sue me.

I was
tapping and refreshing the damn phone at a steady pace. I was well
aware that the attack would come in mere minutes. I must have been
hoping for a cure before that. I certainly didn’t want to
experience one more chase if I could help it.

The
minutes went by.

Nothing.

I
checked my watch.

Calmer
this time, I stood up, left my bag on the ground. I puffed in some
deep breaths, stretched my arms and my legs, just like during
gymnastics time. I used to be on the volleyball team two years ago,
but I got tired of it. Still, the warm-up routine had been
ingrained to my memory, doing movements I didn’t even remember
knowing.

I jogged
in a small circle, checking my watch.

As the
beep sounded I broke the circle path and ran straight ahead,
towards a square brown-red bundle of roof tiles.

I
vaulted over it and her hair missed me by an inch.

Purple
time

Her hair
brushed my neck as I fell on the other side of the roof-tiles. The
gravel was noisy under my feet but gave me a steady grip. I ran
between two lawn statues, Greek-style women that covered their
nakedness with a small piece of cloth.

She came behind me, raised her hand and smashed the head of
the statue with tremendous force. The pieces smashed and fell on my
back, cutting my skin and letting it bleed. I wiped some of the
pieces away with an awkward backhanded gesture but kept
running.

I reached the spot I had marked with an arrow on the white
gravel and spun left. I ran parallel to the street, through the
narrow gaps between the various ornaments and stacks of ceramic
tiles. I glanced back, and there she was, her face a breath away
from mine, smiling.

I squealed and ducked, hitting my elbow on the edge of
something hard. The blow hit bone, numbing my arm. I stood back up
and ran away, my arm refusing to move along, needles piercing my
skin on it.

I ran and wobbled, unable to maintain balance with one arm
tightly gripped on my stomach.

I reached the next mark, spun left again and headed for an
open space to make my finish. The Erinyes came up to me, touched my
thigh and it turned bright purple. I fell on the ground, spinning
from momentum and came to a stop.

Chapter
32

I was in a
foetal position on the ground, in the middle of the strange place,
surrounded by decorations and ornaments that nobody
wanted.

I let it
all out.

I cried
and I vomited, then I cried again.

After a
while, I felt a bit of relief so I stumbled back to my back and
drank from a bottle of water. I checked my phone.

Prodromos had sent a message. “We have a problem. Come meet
me at the barrels.”

I
replied, “No shit we do. You better have something.”

I
ditched school and went to our meeting place.

It took
me a while longer than I thought to find the place. It wasn’t as if
I was really paying attention the first time we got there. In the
end I managed to find a bus that dropped me off a minute’s walk
away.

I saw
the white van from a distance and got closer. As I was walking
behind the vehicle towards the passenger door, a hand swung it open
and I hopped up.

I opened
my mouth, preparing to deliver a stream of nags, insults, WTFs and
some epithets, but Prodromos slapped a device on my head and that
shut me up temporarily.

“
You are late,” she said and adjusted the electrodes on my
head.

I looked
back at the umbilical cord of cables that linked me to the devices
at the back of the van. “Wha- Hey! I don’t have a car you know.
It’s called public transportation, you are always late with
them.”

Prodromos checked the time. I knew what she was checking. My
internal clock was ticking already.

“
Take the seatbelt off, and grab onto something,” she said,
and stood on the gas pedal.

Purple
time

She
appeared through the dashboard, angry and with wide dark eyes. As
the car moved she glided with no corporeality through the van,
opening her mouth in a silent scream and raising her arms towards
each of us. Prodromos and me pulled ourselves away from her grasp
instinctively, and I stared at the woman.

I realised she could see the Erinyes too. The van sped up and
for a moment there was only the sound of heavy wheels spinning on
dirt.

The Erinyes showed up on the van’s roof, tearing through the
metal, rending noises as her purple hair reached down like tendrils
and brushed my cheek. I fell down to the wide gap infront of my
seat and she turned her attention to Prodromos. I realised it was
worse that way, her going for the driver so I stood up again to get
her attention back. I pushed up my bag in my hands like a stupid
shield and taunted her loudly. Her eyes darted to me, her purple
glowing hair swam in the air and twisted around my arms. They hurt,
the places where she touched me burned scalding hot and I screamed
and I let the bag fall through my hands.

I pulled against her gripping hair and she leaned further
down through the hole on the van’s roof.

In a moment of terror I slapped her hard on the smug smiling
face.

She jerked back and her hair turned into razor sharp ends,
cutting my arms and my face in slices of flesh, blood gushing out,
getting into my throat, denying me air.

Chapter
33

I kept
staring at the van’s roof. It was as expected, grey and well, just
sitting there. No holes. I kept my eyes up on the same spot. “You
can see her too,” I whispered.

Prodromos exhaled and gripped the steering wheel. The dust we
shook up was settling around us. We were stopped, a good distance
from our original spot next to the barrels. I noticed a saint’s
picture hanging from the mirror, and her rubbing her own cross
between her fingers. “Nai. It’s happening to me too.”

“
Since when?”

“
Since last night. I was up all night poking and prodding at
the veil phone.”

I
snorted. “I was up all night running away from the
Erinyes.”

“
I know. It began for me this morning too.”

“
What began? What is it exactly?” I asked, prodding the crown
of cables on my head.

As if
she was suddenly reminded of something, she got out the van and
went round the back. She opened the door and sat on her computer
system, looking at the data. I could see digital displays that
showed crooked lines like the ones they show on the news when
there’s an earthquake, but I could tell this was from my
head.

A small
brain was in a diagram, with lit areas around it. Half of it was
turned off.

I
gasped. “Hey! Am I becoming brain dead? Cause you won’t be able to
see any difference on me, you know.”

Prodromos smiled at me and said, “No, you shook the EEG away
when you were thrashing about earlier.”

“
Excuse me for playing decoy,” I said and folded my arms,
throwing the cable mess away on the seat.

She
wasn’t even listening, just staring at her monitors. “It’s OK, I
got the data.” She was murmuring to herself. “Just gotta compare
them to mine. Yup. Damn. Oh, wait… Yup.”

I just
waited in silence. She was in the same mode as Deppy would
sometimes go to, mumbling incoherently over a computer. The only
way out of it was straight through.

Mumble
mumble. Mumble. Grunt. Mumble.

A couple
of days ago, I would combat my boredom at this point by taking
selfies of myself. Somehow, since the Erinyes appeared in my photos
I wasn’t really in a mood to take any more.

Prodromos banged the desk and leaned back.

I
twisted around the front seat, resting my head on the hole to see
the back of the van. “Well? Is it a boy or a girl? Don’t keep me
waiting woman!”

“
It’s unholy, is that it is,” she said seriously.

I went
pfft.

She
raised an eyebrow at me. “Oh, you don’t believe me?” She tapped her
keyboard, did something too fast that I couldn’t really figure out
and a slight pressure came to my ear drums.

I felt
uneasy.

Just
like during an Erinyes attack.

I
checked my watch, it was hours away.

“
No, she’s not coming yet,” Prodromos said and took off her
jersey hat, tossing it on her desk. She tapped the keyboard again
and the pressure stopped. “Infrasound. 18Hz to be precise. It’s
below human hearing, but the mind perceives it all
right.”

“
What about it?”